To Kill A Mockingbird: Racial Prejudice In Literature

Racial prejudice has been a tremendous part of United States history, and it has caused a vast amount of controversy for hundreds of years. There have been many ways people have attempted to counter racism; one example is the Civil War, a more well-known event related to racism. There are, however, less violent ways of fighting this, such as literature. Many authors have addressed racism either subtly or directly in their novels; a few examples are Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. To Kill a Mockingbird is a much more recent novel concerning prejudice in the South particularly. The events in the novel are fairly straight forward, but provide enough metaphors to cause the reader to ruminate about what point Lee is trying to get across to the public. The circumstances provide an understanding of how life was during the early 1930’s through the characters and plot. To

Ruth Lynch was a young girl when she read “To Kill a Mockingbird”. Lynch said that it gave her hope that not all Caucasians were evil and eased her fear of living in a racist world. Laura Bush, the former first lady, says Lee’s novel was created to bring the country together despite the many different backgrounds. Actress Tina Sloan explained how her and her friends were awakened and realized just what racial prejudice was. Anna Strasberg, another actress says that she believes the novel will teach people to trust others more and not judge a book by its cover. Lawyer and author David Baldacci says that Atticus became the inspiration for lawyers everywhere because of his determination to do right. Although these are only a few of the hundreds of people who were influenced by Harper Lee, the message they are trying to send is that Harper Lee has changed millions of peoples’ lives.